My First Thanksgiving after Gastric Bypass Surgery

My very first Thanksgiving since my Gastric Bypass Surgery and I survived without unbuttoning my pants for the first time EVER!! I was very nervous about this holiday since the focus is always on the yummy food, but I am so proud of myself for having some self control.

Holiday Dinners after Gastric Bypass are hard for anyone regardless if it’s your first one or you are years post op. Having all that food and the foods that comfort you at those times can make it so tempting to over eat. Most of the time they are heavy foods such as Appetizers, Potatoes, Candied Yams, Stuffing’s, Pies and rich Desserts etc… Of course all the things we love on the holidays and all the things we now must try and avoid eating lots of. Gone are the days of piling your plate high and doing it twice around.

Thanksgiving was held at my in laws this year – we are all on the holiday rotation. We got there about 3:00 and there was a nice spread of appetizers out to snack on. I brought a cheese platter with cheese, pepperoni, olives and marinated roasted red peppers along with some crackers for everyone and there were lots of other yummy choices too.

Appetizer time is a hard one for me cause it is so easy to just pick pick pick. I tried to make good choices and my brother in law had out some Jumbo Shrimp and cocktail sauce so I had a few of those and then I had some crackers with a piece of cheese on them along with the marinated red peppers (yum). I had some olives and a few tortilla chips with salsa. I did have to tell myself to walk away at some point because my head just wanted to continue to eat.

Originally when it came to dinner I was going to eat off of a salad plate, but I ended up eating on the same plates as everyone else. We sat down for dinner around 6:30.

Just like with the appetizers there was so much food when it came to dinner we really could have fed a small army. So I took all my favorites, but very small portions of them unlike what my plate looked like last year. My rule is to never deprive myself of the things I love – I just eat much less of them. In my before photo of my plate I had Stuffing, Candied Yams, Green Bean Casserole, Mashed Potatoes, Corn Casserole and my Turkey with Cranberry Sauce.

I tried to eat all my Turkey first cause ya know the rule – Protein First. Well I did my best because I wanted to be sure to get in some of my other favorites on the plate.

As you can see in my After photo I could not even finish it all.

I was so proud of myself – again my head was telling me to finish it all, but I fought those little devils in there and said NO WAY!!!

For the very first Thanksgiving in as long as I can remember I did not have to unbutton my pants and have that sick to my stomach feeling. In addition to that I actually had a belt on for the first time in years to hold them up. Is that a change or what?

Dessert came out at about 7:30, but being I am not a huge dessert fan (lucky me right?) I just had a couple cups of coffee and besides my pouch was still pretty full and satisfied from dinner.

It was a great time with all my family and all the kids and another accomplishment under my belt (literally cause I had one on).

Kids stayed at my in laws for the night so hubby and I were home alone – I ended up dipping into the leftovers when we got home around 11:00 pm for a tiny portion of corn casserole. My brother in law makes it and it is one of my favs. Then I was up on the computer until about 3:30 am which is so unlike me to be up that late, but before bed I had a small leftover Turkey Sandwich. I did not eat it all – shared it with my 3 dogs – hee hee. I had a nice full belly for bed.

So there you have it my First Thanksgiving since Gastric Bypass – not too shabby!! Hope you all survived and did not over eat as well.